Harry Potter and the Palatable Pastry
by Writingathing
Summary: A half-starved Harry Potter attends his first Hogwarts Feast and sees something magical.
1. The First Feast

_Please, sir, may I have some more?_

Harry Potter sat nervously at the chattering Gryffindor table. The conversation with the Sorting Hat had been..._creepy_...and now everyone was staring at him. No, they were staring at his scar, his famous scar, apparently a mark from Lord...wait, you weren't supposed to say his name, were you? Were you allowed to think it?

_More? Ha! The boy thinks he's a king!_

_It's only a little gruel, sir!_

_Take a look at this, Petunia, the boy thinks we care! _

_Laughter, Dudley's ham-like fist, and pain._

Harry hated the attention. Attention meant pain, mockery, torture. He was only safe alone stashed in a nook with something to read where no one could find him, where he could be free, however temporarily, from the constant nagging ache in his stomach.

The ancient wizard—Harry still felt a little thrill every time he thought that word; he was a wizard, and he didn't even know what that means but it meant he was different, special, and far away from the Dursleys—Albus Dumbledore was his name, if Harry could remember, although he was certain he had misheard it, winded down his speech.

"But enough talk," the Headmaster said jovially. "Let's get straight to the feast," and he waved his wand and Harry's eyes nearly popped out of his head—

Piles of steaks, mountains of potatoes, bowls heaped with bright red tomatoes, platters of cheese, pies, lamb chops, clangers, peas, sausages, dumplings and plates of faggots, jellied eels, pasties...

On and on and on the plates of food ran, down the table as far as he could see, and everyone was helping themselves and so Harry grabbed a fork and speared a Yorkshire pudding—

"Don't forget to leave room for desert!" Dumbledore's cheery voice said above the din of dinner.

Harry had never eaten desert before, but he barely heard Dumbledore as he piled more and more food onto his plate and stuffed forkfuls into his mouth almost as quickly. He didn't care if the other children thought the famous Harry Potter was a glutton; he had never seen so much food in his life and no one was here to take it away from him—

A bloodbath, a massacre, the dessicated remains of the dinner lay splattered along the plate, on Harry's robes and smeared across his face. He groaned happily, massaging his bulging belly, reveling in the strange feeling of a full stomach—

The food vanished, and Harry almost cried out, but then new plates appeared on the table piled high with desserts. Candies, jelly, arctic role and apple pie, custards and cakes of all kinds, blancmange and treacle tart, trifle and mince pie, spoom and scones, clootie and—

Harry's heart almost stopped beating.

At first it looked like a tall doughnut, but as they rotated into view the insides were layered, flaky and moist. Topped with slices of strawberry, surrounded by a crispy golden exterior, it was—

Hogwarts _was_ a magical school after all.

—a _cronut_.

Harry reached out a trembling hand towards the plate of doughnut-croissant hybrids. Saliva leaked out of his mouth and sweat beaded on his forehead as his nervous fingers neared the ultimate pastry. Its fried surface crackled invitingly, its layered insides waved alluringly. He reached down, clasped his hand around a glazed, tender treat—

Harry blinked.

The cronuts were gone.

"Sorry, Harry," Ron said, happily munching on a cronut. "You've got to move faster than that if you want to get your hands on a cronut."

The world blurred in and out of focus. Harry was spinning, spinning—

_Still asleep this late, boy? It's almost seven o'clock! No breakfast for you!_

"Harry, Harry, are you all right?" Hermione shrieked as Harry's eyes rolled up into the back of his head.

_Hey, Harry, want some of what I'm having? Kidney pie is way better than gruel! Oh, you don't? Oh, that's too bad, because it's really, really delicious. _

"Catch him!" somebody shouted as Harry fell backwards off the bench—

_No, please, not Harry, kill me instead, please—_

_Lily and James are dead, the old wizard sighed, and haggard witch sobbed._

_You must take him in, the old wizard said to the astonished Vernon Dursley. There is no other way. Clothe him, feed him, make him strong...before long the Wizarding world will have need of him again._

—Harry's head hit the floor, and there was only darkness.


	2. Second Year's Beginning

Harry swept dramatically through the Great Hall, his black cloak gliding behind him. A long hooded cowl obscured his face in darkness, and the other students broke out into whispered murmuring as he passed by. Only two glittering green lights glowing an eery emerald in the shadow of his hood distinguished him from a Dementor.

Harry sat down heavily at the Gryffindor table, bringing a hushed silence upon the so-called House of courage.

"Hey, Harry," Ron said nervously, his voice cracking.

"Silence!" Harry hissed. "You will call me by my chosen name."

"Uh...hey, Dark Harry, is everything okay?"

"Not now, you fool," Harry snapped. "I must concentrate."

Harry scowled in his cowl. The rest of the world dropped away as he focused his full attention on the plate in front of him. He didn't pay attention to its white sheen or the shining silverware, the restored chatter of the Gryffindor table or Snape's burning glare on the back of his cloak.

He was waiting.

Waiting for the food.

_Tick_.

Right on time, the food appeared, a procession of offerings, tribute from the slaves who worked in the kitchens below, bearing meats, pies, and platters of potatoes and vegetables. It ran on and on, enough food to satisfy a starving war-god and a hundred virgins to be ravished that night.

Harry didn't move. He had learned, after a long, painful year he had learned how the complete abandonment of himself to the orgy of food led to reduced reflexes, slow, lethargic movements, blurred, distorted senses. No, there was only one thing to do.

He would wait.

The other children reached out with forks, spearing choice red meats, heaping potatoes and cauliflower onto their plates, lifting glistening lamb chops and crisp pasties reverently before their eager mouths. Pumpkin juice in their goblets, they clinked their glasses together, toasting the start of another year at Hogwarts.

Harry waited.

The children's joyous laughter rose into the air. The feast fueled their minds as much as their bodies, nourished hope and gave strength and body to dreams. A small, stick-thin red-headed girl with a missing tooth and a bashful smile bit into a juicy red tomato, the sweet, crunchy fruit spilling its seeds over her lips, and she looked down the table at Harry. The warmth of the feast filled her with courage, and she waved a hand at him.

"Harry, aren't you going to eat? Try a tomato, they're really good!"

Harry waited. Her words meant nothing.

The feast ran on and on. The songs and revelry of Hogwarts shook the very walls as spirits ran higher and higher. Only one boy didn't join in. Only one boy waited.

Waited.

Waited.

Waited.

_Tick._

The food began to vanish. Instantaneously, and yet it moved it slow motion, spilled juices and sauce evaporating into the air, leftover steaks disappearing, potatoes dissipating and pies melting away like ice cream dropped into the fire.

Harry waited. His eyes, bloodshot and unblinking, watched the plate.

And Harry waited.

Albus Dumbledore, the greatest wizard in the world, savior of Britain, defeater of Grindelwald and discoverer of the twelve uses of dragon's blood, worried the corner of his mouth with a long finger.

"Interesting, very interesting," he breathed. "Could it be? Power...the Dark Lord knows not..."

Snape's head jerked around. "What?" he whispered. "What do you mean, Headmaster?"

"Tom...Tom never could resist," the ancient wizard said slowly, as if the pieces to a great puzzle were coming together in his mind even as he constructed it for the Potions Master. "That was his mistake the night James and Lily died."

Snape flinched at the sound of Lily's name. "Headmaster," he murmured, "Surely you cannot mean—"

Dumbledore inclined his head. "I do. Tonight, Severus, you will take him into the Chamber of Secrets. You will begin his training there."

"Tonight? You cannot be serious! He is but a boy..."

"Now you care for him so, old friend?" Dumbledore said quietly.

"He is—" Snape's voice caught, "He is Lily's son, he does not deserve, no one deserves—"

"I know." Dumbledore looked away. "I know."

And Harry looked up as the desserts began to appear. In front of him, on a grand golden plate with fine ruby embroidery, _they_ materialized. First the soft, flaky, layered interior, moist and hot, exuding the smell of melted butter, and then around it a round crispy exterior, golden brown, flaked with sugar, appearing for all the world to be a simple, if exquisitely prepared, doughnut.

But Harry knew.

This was no mere doughnut.

And his trembling fingers reached out, grasping, calling...

_No! No, Lily, how could—he swore, I never, no, NO!_

Snape shut his eyes, but it didn't help, it never helped.

_His shaking fingers reached out to brush the hair away from her brow, hair he had always wanted to stroke, to love..._

Harry's fingers closed around the pastry...

_He gently lowered her eyelids, and kissed her cheek._

The boy, the boy, Severus thought. I must save the boy.

And Harry brought the pastry to his mouth, his tongue reaching upward like a baby bird feeding from its mother, drops of saliva falling from his mouth glittering like diamonds, and his lips met the crispy baked dough, and it yielded beneath his teeth.

_I'm so, so sorry, Lily._

I'm so, so sorry.


End file.
